The fix for Grip too weak
Fixing a weak grip
What is actually happening
The hands sit rotated toward the target on the handle, so the lead wrist has to do extra work to square the face in the time available. A weak grip does not cause a slice on its own, but it makes an open face the default outcome rather than something the golfer has to actively produce.
- Chin and shoulders
- Knuckles showing: 2
- V points at the chin
The fix
Your hands sit turned toward the target on the handle. Looking down at address, a right-handed golfer with a weak grip sees one knuckle on the lead hand or none, the V between thumb and forefinger points at the lead shoulder or outside it, and the trail hand sits on top of the handle rather than beside it. Left-handers should mirror everything on this page.
A weak grip does not swing the club and does not cause a slice on its own. What it does is make squaring the face harder. The face has to turn back to square in the brief moment before impact, and with the hands turned toward the target the lead wrist has more of that turning to do in the same time. When it runs short, the face arrives open. With this grip that is the default outcome, not something you have to do wrong to produce.
The face decides, for the most part, where the ball starts, so an open face starts the ball right of the line a square one would have. If the path is running down the target line or left of it, the face is also open to the path, and the gap between them bends the ball right. An open face adds effective loft as well, so the flight tends to be higher and weaker than the club should give you, and shorter.
Confirming it takes a mirror and ten seconds. Take your normal grip without adjusting anything and count the knuckles on your lead hand. One or none is weak. Then look at the pattern: shots that start on the target or right of it and curve right, with every club including the short irons, and divots that point at the target while the ball does not.
That last detail matters, because two related faults also send the ball right. An in-to-out path does it with the divot pointing right and a ball that curves left or flies straight. A face aimed off at address does it before the swing starts, and a still photo from behind the ball shows it. A weak grip usually sits behind a face that looks square at address. The face only opens once the club is moving.
The change is made at address, and only the hands move. Hold the club out in front of you at waist height with the leading edge pointing straight up. Place the lead hand so the handle runs diagonally across the fingers, from the base of the little finger to the middle of the index finger, then turn the hand away from the target until two knuckles show. The V should point somewhere between your chin and your trail shoulder. Add the trail hand beside it, palm facing roughly toward the target, its V pointing into the same zone. The leading edge stays pointing straight up the whole time.
The instinctive fix for a ball that goes right is to aim further left. That points the path left too, which opens the face even further relative to it and turns a weak fade into a slice. Flipping the hands hard through impact to close the face works on one swing and hooks the next, because it relies on timing rather than position. And a golfer trying a stronger grip often turns the club along with the hands, which shuts the face at address, sends the ball left, and convinces them the new grip does not work. Turn the hands on the handle. Leave the face where it was.
Once the grip is fixed, expect some shots to go left for a while. If your path has been working left to allow for the slice, a face that now closes to match that path sends the ball straight left. That is a pull, it means the grip change has taken, and the path is the next thing to look at.
Drills
Work through them in order. Each one says what it needs before you start.
Build it in the air
Hold the club out at waist height with the leading edge pointing straight up. Build the grip there: lead hand turned until two knuckles show, then the trail hand added with its palm facing the target. Lower the club to the ground behind a ball without letting the hands turn, then look down and count. Take the hands fully off the club and repeat twenty times. Success is two knuckles showing on all twenty without any adjustment once the club is down. Do this before every session for two weeks before you trust the grip on the course.
Needs nothing but a club
Old grip, new grip
With a mid-iron and the same target throughout, hit five balls with your old grip and five with the new one, and repeat that pairing three times. Keep the swing the same and change only the hands. After each set of five, note where the balls started and which way they curved. Success is a clear difference: the new grip starts the ball nearer the target with less curve to the right. If there is no difference at all, the grip was not the main cause, and the path deserves a look before you go further.
Needs nothing but a club
Lead hand only, half swings
Hold a short iron in the lead hand only, in the new grip, and make hip-high to hip-high swings at balls teed low. Let the back of the lead hand face the target at impact without forcing it there. Hit fifteen. Success is solid contact with the ball starting on line. Then add the trail hand and hit fifteen more half swings chasing the same feeling, and move up to three-quarter and then full swings once those start on line as well.
Needs A few tees
Practice plan and log
Practise this fix, day by day
Keep a dated log of every session against this fix, so in a few weeks you can read back whether the change has taken instead of trying to remember.
Checkpoints
What to look for to know whether the change has taken.
- Looking down at address, two knuckles show on the lead hand, not one or none.
- The V between thumb and forefinger on each hand points between your chin and your trail shoulder, not at your lead shoulder.
- The trail palm faces roughly toward the target rather than down at the ground.
- Once the grip is built, the leading edge is still square to the target line: the hands turned and the club did not.
- Short iron shots start nearer the target and curve right less than they did.
Feels
A feel is not a description of what the club does. It is whatever gets your body to do it, and a correct change usually feels exaggerated long before it looks correct.
- The lead hand feels turned too far away from the target, as if you are showing the back of the glove to someone standing in front of you.
- The trail hand feels as if it sits underneath the handle rather than on top of it.
- Through impact the face turns over on its own, with no effort from the hands.
Symptoms that lead here
Each of these can resolve to this cause. If the page above does not match what you are seeing, start from the symptom instead and let the questions narrow it.
- My grip is too strong or too weakYour hands sit turned too far one way on the handle, the face keeps arriving open or closed, and the ball misses to the same side shot after shot.The usual cause of this
- The clubface opens or shuts as soon as I take it backStopped where the shaft is parallel to the ground, the face is already pointing up at the sky or down at the ground instead of matching the angle of your spine.
- Slicing the ballThe ball curves hard to the right and finishes well right of where you aimed.
- I can't hit a drawYou set up to curve the ball from right to left and it fades anyway, or it starts right and never turns back, so the draw is never there when you want it.
- Not releasing the clubThe face never seems to turn over through the ball, the finish feels held off, and shots either block right or fade away weakly.
- Everything is going rightYour misses all finish right of the target, some flying dead straight on a line right of it and some bending further right as they go.
If this is not it: causes that produce the same shots
What this rests on
- Search for the Perfect Swing: The Proven Scientific Approach to Fundamentally Improving Your GameAlastair Cochran and John Stobbs, for the Golf Society of Great Britain, 2005 reissue, originally 1968
- 40+ TrackMan Parameters ExplainedTrackMan, accessed 2026
- The Influence of Face Angle and Club Path on the Resultant Launch Angle of a Golf BallPaul Wood, Erik Henrikson, Chris Broadie, 2018
Did this help?
One answer, and nothing is published from it. A fix that keeps getting a no is a fix that is wrong, and this is the only way that shows up.
If something here is wrong, or contradicts what a launch monitor tells you, say so. Corrections change the page.
The weekly fix
One fault a week, written the same way this page is.
Discussion
Golfers who have worked on this fault, on what helped and what did not. Read it as experience rather than evidence.
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